Abstract: Cultural encounters are a dominant feature of contemporary society. Identities are ever-changing ‘routes’ as Hall and others have stated, so we become insiders and outsiders to our own lives. The manifaceted expression of cultural belonging and its formation is illustrated by examples from Australasian writers who express not only the conflict of belonging to more than one culture, but also its inherent value. Such writers provide the reader with alternative ways of reading culture and illustrate the increasing trend to see ourselves as hyphenated people belonging nowhere specific in a globalised world.
Keywords: bi/multicultural encounters, cultural belonging, hyphenated people, insiders and outsiders
Copyright © Anne Holden Rønning 2009. This text may be archived and redistributed both in electronic form and in hard copy, provided that the author and journal are properly cited and no fee is charged.